It may have taken me a while to notice and then a while longer to get around to mentioning it, but it was a great thing to know that my begging did not go to waste regarding the Irish Blog award nominations. My thanks extend to the nominatory elves who filled out the form. It’s more than I managed to do. Of course, this meant judges visited the blog and read it. Had I noticed they were going to do something like that, I would have ended up trying to write something hilarious to win me something to fit on my, already overflowing, desk; now featuring a WWI medal, Stanley knife and Tibetan Temple Bell (What, you don’t have one?). In any case, they didn’t like what they found here as much as what they found elsewhere. I think it was mainly due to my habit of referring to the British as a Liberation Army rather than the more colourful terms the Irish usually use. My use of the words “peasant mentality” were also unlikely to have found favour with the judging panel. No official long-list nominations for me, I’m afraid.

I may not have any prizes, but I have received a small bump in traffic. This increase in attention has led to communications reaching my inbox (as well as comments linking to websites of a dubious nature). It’s nice to receive communications. They make me feel wanted. Unfortunately, I’m not the greatest at replying to any of them. Much of this is due to my inability to actually read them. I only check my email when I’m expecting something and I only read my email while I’m waiting for something to arrive. I consider inbox twelve hundred an achievement. The majority of the information clogging up my inbox comes from circulars and newsletters. They aren’t important things, but they are usually things I need to at least cast my eye over. When I reach something which consists of an actual communiqué from a real person who typed it out using their real fingers rather than smacking their head against a keyboard until the space was filled, it gets filed away in the “address this later” folder and never returned to. I have massive guilt due to a bloke who took the time and the trouble to tell me that he’d read my MS on Authonomy, thought it was wonderful and hoped that I would finish it because he couldn’t bear the idea that it would go to waste. He sought out my email address because he noticed that I wasn’t using the Authonomy website anymore. How nice is that? Yet, I ignored him. If he’s reading this now, I apologise profusely and admit that while I could have spent my time sending you a note instead of writing this, I didn’t. It’s the kind of person I am.

When I’m not receiving undeservedly kind and complementary messages, I receive messages offering me monies to place advertisements on my website. For some reason, these are in Dutch. For further and slightly bizarre reasons, I’m able to read them pretty well without the help of Google Translate. Apparently I’m able to speak Dutch now.

I’ve also received a message offering me an interview with some guy I’ve never heard of, who will be able to give valuable advice and information to the OAP members of my readership. I’m sorry to disappoint the OAP members of my readership, but I’m of the opinion that if you have the nous to operate a computer well enough to find your way here, you are doing better than he is. He can’t manage to employ marketing people who read enough of a blog to realise it’s not the kind of thing they are looking for before they cut and paste a message off to its author.

Numerous mails have arrived to let me know that I have inherited several thousand dollars and that this money can be transferred to my account as soon as I forward them my bank details. I’m very impressed with these particular scamming emails. There is only a slight lapse in the quality of the language used towards the end of the message. If I were less cynical and didn’t know my entire family tree back to the thirteenth century, I might consider the possibility it was true.

Anyway, congratulations to all those on the long-list and good luck with the next round.

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GASP at the tortuous points eventually made! GURGLE politely at the laboured jokes! SHARE with the people you claim are your friends! Oscar Wilde, Stephen Hawking and Jeremy Clarkson are just a selection of the people Theo has never been compared with. Droll and instructive are the adjectives only she applies to this blog. We Hope you enjoy it.